The Drumbeat of Change
by LyricsArePoetry
Summary: Koschei's moving to a new part of the Academy which means leaving his home and everything familiar. How does he cope with this? What do the drums think of this?


**The Drumbeat of Change  
>Chapter One<br>Koschei's POV**

It all got off to a flying start, such a brilliant start, and they say start as you mean to go on don't they? Well that is exactly what I did. Oh and that's sarcasm by the way. I'm a sarcastic git as you'll come to realise if you keep reading. Although I have to wonder who you are and why you're reading this. Anyway, so I woke up to this tight feeling in my throat. Don't worry I wasn't being strangled or suffocated or anything like that, I was simply feeling like crap. The tight feeling in my throat was complemented almost instantly by a thumping in my head which would not go away by lying there and waiting for it to pass. Just a headache, I bet you're thinking. Not worth complaining about, a migraine at worse, you might think? It's common, get over it. That along the lines of what you're thinking? Ha! What would you know? Well let me tell you how much of a bloody joke that is. This was not just a headache, I would actually pay money to have just a headache because it is never just a headache. It's the drums, it's always the drumming, the never ending drumbeat within my head that gets worse at times, leaving me in some much pain I can barely think. This was one of those times.

Still I knew I had to ignore them, I had to get ready to go, to go when I wouldn't be coming back for a long period of time. The thought was terrifying me and I knew that was exactly why the drums were making their presence so known. They loved everything I hated. They got so excited. They pounded and thumped louder and louder. The second I sat up in bed the whole of Gallifrey seemed to be spinning light years faster than it should've been, the dizziness overpowered me and it was some miracle that I didn't lose consciousness. I forced myself to my feet, one hand pressed against the nearest wall to keep myself upright. I didn't move for a long moment, the boxes of my things seemed to be taunting me, like they knew they were the reason for my pain and they were glad of that.

When I finally felt I could move without the ground moving from under my feet, I forced myself to the shower. I leant against the wall of the shower allowing the warm water to rush over me. Momentarily I felt better, the world went back to spinning at the right speed, and it was as though the chains around my throat were loosened and I could breathe again, the drums quietened and my mind cleared. I forced myself to think about good things, things that would keep me calm. Things like Theta. Theta who could always make it better. Theta who I wasn't going to see for so long because I was going. Oh Theta. I wasn't sure if I could do this without him.

The dizziness washed over me again, worse this time than it had been before. I stopped the water and wrapped a towel around me, my hands shaking as I did so. Quickly I realised it wasn't just my hands shaking, my whole body was physically shaking, completely out of my control. The drums were back to making a racket, louder and louder and louder, it hurt so much. I pressed a hand to my forehead trying to ward them off, knowing it was pointless though. I forced myself to my bedroom, a well-timed grab for the door handle the only thing stopping me from collapsing on the floor.

Once I made it into my bedroom, I firmly shut the door and let myself fall to the ground. I could feel the tears pricking at my eyes, my whole body was hurting physically and mentally. My throat was in chains once again and worse now a sickness was forcing its way up. I knew I was still shaking, everything hurt. It was as though my whole body was rejecting the idea of this change. It didn't want it, it couldn't deal with it. _I _couldn't deal with it. It and I wanted everything to stay the same, I wanted to get back into bed and let this feeling pass and go to school at the same place, to see Theta daily. I want everything to be normal. It wouldn't hurt it if it stayed normal.

After more time that I really had I forced myself to move and I did that I thought about it. Every action I was making was forced, it was more effort than normal and that was making it worse. The drums wanted me to stop, to give up, to give them what they want and the temptation was so high. I wanted to call my Mum up and tell her I'd changed my mind, I didn't want to progress in the Academy, I just wanted to stay exactly where I was with everything exactly the same. I couldn't though, I couldn't bear the disappointing, disapproving look my Dad would give me and I couldn't do that to myself. I wanted to do this, I needed to do this, it just hurt so damn much.

Once I had forced myself into clothes, I looked around my room to check there was nothing that wasn't packed that I needed. I was sure I was missing something, I was sure there was something I needed, something important, something that I would remember the second I got there when it would be too late. I looked around my room twice, and even started looking through some of the boxes to make sure everything was there. I pulled out the checklist I had made weeks ago and started making sure I knew where everything was but still I was sure something was missing. I couldn't shake the feeling that this was going to be a complete disaster. If it wasn't something I had forgotten it would be something else. And the real problem was I didn't even know if it was me thinking that or if it was the drums making me think it.

"Koschei, we have everything stop panicking," Dad told me rolling his eyes slightly. He didn't understand. Of course he didn't. He spent the majority of the time when I was between the ages of 8 and 12 telling me that the drums weren't real and I had to stop this ridiculous attention seeking and grow up. Once I was 12 I got the message and shut up about them, never mentioning them. I just acted trying to be the perfect Time Lord son he wanted.

"It'll be fine, Sweetie," Mum told me, kissing my cheek and ignoring the way I automatically sort of pulled away. It was because I was too old for that sort of thing from my Mum and it was because I wanted to just let her hug me and talk me out of going but I knew that deep down I didn't want that, so I couldn't let that happen. I was going to miss her, though I probably wouldn't admit that to anyone, especially not her herself, but she was great most of the time.

After pulling away from Mum, I took one more look over my things, mentally going through everything and making sure it was there and prepared to set off. Never had I been so sure and yet so unsure about what I was doing at the same time.

* * *

><p><strong>Basically, the morning I moved to university I felt sick and this thought came into my mind "it's like my body's rejecting the change," and I got excited about the line so I stored it in my mind and forget it with the plan of using it in a fanfic. Days later (I moved on Sunday) I've finally got around to writing it. I'm probably going to be writing more chapters to this, like the journey there and arriving and the first few days there and stuff. It's been a complicated and confusing week and Koschei is such a perfect character to write about it for because I can exaggerate it and make it so much force for him (Sorry Kosch). R&amp;R and I'll love you forever.<strong>


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